How To Take Two Weeks Off Every 3 Months & Make More Money, Play More And Build A Bigger Business
When people hear that this year I took 2 weeks off every 3 months, they are shocked. One very analytical client wrote, “Ok, how does this work? You’ll be off all appointments and coaching 3 full months this year?!” I replied with a chuckle, “Yeah, isn’t it great?”
Today I want to share with you how to take more time off, make more money, play more, enjoy your life and build a big business all at the same time. You can do it simply and you can do it now.
First things first.
How do you feel when I say I am taking this much time off? Do you feel like that is good for others but it would never happen to you? Does your blood pressure rise? Do you feel anger or even jealousy? Oh come on now, be honest. I had ALL of those feelings in my past of building businesses. When someone told me 20 years ago that it would be a good plan to have at least 6 months of all expenses tucked away for an emergency the first thing that flew out of my mouth was, “Well I’d like to have just one week, thank you very much!” Can you relate?
It would frustrate me when people said to take time off, rest more, relax and take good care of myself. I was STRIVING to build a big business and chasing my dream! For goodness sake I’ll sleep when I am dead! And sadly, dead I almost was. Crashed. Ready to kick it all in. Forget it. Give up, this is a pipe dream and to be very blatantly honestly, these words flew out of my mouth,
“There is no way in hell I will EVER build a business, ever again.”
But God. WOW. God had a different plan and HE TAUGHT me how to rest, prosper and grow even when I’m NOT working.
Taking time off and really enjoying it takes much more than just a big bankroll. It takes a big belief. You have to first change your beliefs about time off and time on. Sadly, the corporate mindset has programmed so many people to ONLY enjoy time off and to resent time on that most people live for weekends. What a pathetic way to live. Sad. But let’s examine this statement for what it is.
Time off and time on is a corporate mentality that infers that we disconnect our personal lives from our business lives. This is the path of most people in a job. Even if they own their own business, many budding entrepreneurs are merely living their life like the business is their boss and they are the worst paid, most undervalued employee! It’s time that we begin to turn ourselves FULLY onto what God designed. You will never find in His plan of success a disengagement of our talents, gifts or abilities and you will NEVER find a plan of leading us away from family, fun and the things we enjoy.
Hard work becomes an amazing pleasure when you are living the way you were designed to live.
People tell me every day they ‘Wish they could take time off’ or they ‘Sure do hope they can quit their job one day to live a life of freedom.’ This reveals a bigger problem then just a lack of real business understanding. It shows someone who doesn’t know who they are, what they want or what they should be doing in the world.
When you come to a point where your greatest strength is showing up daily in business, your work will be a real pleasure and you won’t have to recover after a hard day’s effort and accomplishment! You’ll enjoy your time off and enjoy your days in the office and the disconnect will no longer occur. You will stop feeling guilty when you get brilliant marketing plans in the middle of a Sunday church service and you won’t feel like it is a horrific sin to have big dreams at night about building a huge multi-million dollar enterprise!
Learning to live free begins with learning to know what YOU want your life to look like. My life this year has 3 months off. It has 3 months where I can devour a ton of books, walk along beaches, sleep in, parasail in Maui, go snorkeling with turtles, buy dresses in high end boutiques and even get more than one Louis Vuitton handbag, paid with cash without any regret! It includes giving hundreds of thousands of dollars to the poor, investing my time, talent and abilities into hundreds of thousands of our clients lives and being FULLY ON when I step into my office, whenever I map that out to be.
So, how do YOU get to take two weeks off and stay afloat and on task? Here are a few tips to get you started-
#1- Your beliefs about taking this time for yourself has to be a big priority.
You can’t keep putting yourself last. YOU my friend, are the biggest asset in your business. Take good care of you. Eat right, get enough sleep, take good supplements, keep a clean heart and steward YOU like it’s the biggest gift you’ve ever been given, because, truly it is.
Give yourself time to breathe. Give yourself time to live and stop, right now, letting others dictate what is best for you. I realize it can be a big change, I’ve been there…. at first you might feel like a drug addict looking for a vein when your entire life has been designed to please and pattern yourself after the expectations everyone else had of you, HOWEVER, I’m also here to say YOU CAN DO IT. If I did, you can , too.
#2- Start small and give yourself time off now.
One of the most pathetic things I see people do is ‘shoot for something they can’t do and give up what they can do’. Don’t be that way. Start now, today, and schedule a 3-day weekend every 2 months. Tell your pulse to slow down and get over it. IT’S TIME.
Schedule a 3-day weekend where you take Friday away from everything. Then spin it up a bit and take Monday off, with a Sat, Sun and Mon off!
Get it on the schedule and pay strict attention to this, like you would a doctors appointment you can’t miss! If you don’t do this, you might end up with some doctors appointments and eventually you’ll have to do it anyways, so do it now.
Last year I took off 9 weeks during the year and it was one of the biggest breakthroughs I’ve ever had in my life and business, personally. That didn’t happen however until I ‘increased my faith’ and took some 3-day weekends prior to a long 10 day vacation.
Do it now.
#3- Be accountable to a coach. Listen, I’m not pitching myself to you. If you have someone you can work with and they are helping you get big results in your business AND your life, great! But if you don’t, you had better start taking this more seriously. You can’t keep making yourself accountable to a bunch of peers who aren’t doing what you want to do!
Put self-imposed constraints around yourself. This is how Olympic athletes, executives, aspiring writers, singers and anyone who has a goal that is beyond the norm gets the job done.
You can’t keep living your life like everyone else if you want to live a totally different life!
Schedule the time and make it something that can’t be changed. Your family will feel loved. Your spouse will be so excited! But more than even all of these amazing results you’ll gain, you will tell YOURSELF that you are valuable by getting someone to hold you accountable and then accomplish your goal.
Get a coach and be accountable with your actions. Stop trying to do things alone. And just a side tip…. stop working with coaches who work 24/7, are always available by phone, email, and any other connection you’d happen to have! Start working with people who have the kind of life you want! It makes a world of difference.
#4- Get a grip on how you’re living your life now.
Time management is not the key, life design is the goal. There are hundreds of thousands of people I’ve personally met through our client base, our social media connections, live events and beyond who confess that they ‘have the latest planner’ and still feel completely out of control.
Remember, you have to associate enormous pleasure with getting your life back in control. Enormous pain should be what you attach to being all over the place and constantly feeling bad about how you feel. It all starts with a decision.
Quit hanging out on free Facebook groups where everyone is talking about supporting everyone else and no one is going anywhere. Get a kitchen timer and “Hit the floor RUNNING” everyday, setting the timer to one full hour of full on hard work!”
Schedule breaks, be honest with yourself, write out that To Do list and do whatever it takes to get it DONE!
If you want to take two weeks off every 3 weeks it’s not going to happen because God drops a new life on top of the one you’re now struggling in like some wild “Wizard Of Oz” fantasy. It will happen because you planned it, you did what it takes to make it happen. You worked hard and put away some extra money so that you can take the time off and you did whatever it takes to live the life you are dreaming of.
We are so grateful to have a large community growing here at A Real Change International.
I’m so honored to be able to encourage you, work with you and make a big change in the world, all of us working together to make it a reality. It’s time, my friends, it’s time. 2016 is the YEAR where the dreams you’ve been praying about are going to be MANIFEST before your very eyes.
Now go do what it takes to make it happen. I’ve given you clear step by step strategies that can get anyone off to the best start!
Ready.. set… GO! 🙂
With love,
Sandi Krakowski
P.S. If you currently lack the skill set to run a profitable and sustainable business, I just did something really radical in my Inner Circle Mastermind and Small Business Academy! I added at no additional cost 60+ full length classes. NO ONE can ever say, “I’ll take your classes when I have money Sandi” because I just made them available for free in my already ridiculous priced Inner Circle! Just $77 and you could CHANGE YOUR LIFE and take as much time off as you like. If you’re not an Inner Circle Member yet, what are you waiting for? The price goes up on October 1st, so don’t delay! www.arealchange.com/innercircle
